Israel arrests three of their allied SLA officers suspecting spy penetration
The Israeli occupation forces are launching an arrest campaign in south Lebanon after successive successful operations carried out by Lebanese resistance forces resulted in raising suspicions of cooperation maintained between several officials in the Israeli-allied South Lebanon Army militia and Hizbullah, a matter which has been greatly talked about following al-Ansareyah operation, through concentrating on the existence of a "double agent."
In occupied Jerusalem, Israeli security sources stressed the arrest of three officers from the SLA, whose leader is Antoine Lahd, including "a senior security man." This was in contradiction to the official story which denied any connection between the campaign of arrest Israel launched in the villages located in the eastern sector of south Lebanon and the killing of an Israeli Army official in the region, General Erez Gerstein, just one month ago.
The Israeli mass media quoted these sources as saying that the arrest campaign, which targeted some 40 Druze citizens from the villages of Hasbaya, Eble, al-Saqqi and Ein Qenya, also covered three members of the SLA security forces, including a high-ranking security man.
The arrests fall in the course of intensive investigations carried out by Israeli intelligence following the death of Gerstein on February 18. The investigation centered on the possibility of cooperation between SLA officers and the Hizbullah, including the transfer of precise information on Gerstein's movements.
The Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot said that the Israeli occupation forces on Friday prevented the Druze citizens from the villages of Hasbaya, Eble al-Saqqi and Ein Qunya from leaving the occupied border strip through the five crossing points controlled by Israel.
The same Israeli paper disclosed news that a high-ranking officer in the SLA militia who worked for years for Israel fled several months ago, a matter which constituted a hard blow to the Israeli intelligence in the area. The Israeli daily added that the officer who was indicated to by the letter "R" had contacted Hizbullah and unveiled details of the activities of a network of spies working inside Lebanon.
According to the Israeli security system, the "fleeing" officer helped a group of citizens of the occupied region, which in turn helped Hizbullah in the region.
Israeli analysts attributed the phenomenon of "separation" that has started to appear in the line of the SLA to a series of measures taken by the Lebanese government against Israel's allies in south Lebanon.
Among these measures is the identification of those SLA allies as "traitors," taking court decisions against them in absentia as well as other measures inducing pressure against their families.